Police divers today searched a trout lake close to the home of a dentist facing a double murder charge in Northern Ireland.
The grounds of Dr Colin Howell's luxury home near Castlerock, Co Derry were also checked.
Mr Howell is in custody charged with the murders 18 years ago of his wife Lesley and his ex-lover's policeman husband, Constable Trevor Buchanan.
It's not known if officers had been acting on any specific information but decided to send for a dive team as part of their inquiries. They were not looking for human remains.
A police spokesperson said: "Searches are being carried out as part of an ongoing police investigation into serious crime. These searches using specialist resources are concentrated on land and a lake in the grounds of a private house at Castlerock."
The lake — a trout fishery used by anglers — is just behind Mr Howell's seven bedroom house at Glebe Road which has been vacant for several weeks after his second wife, American-born Kyle and the couple's 10 children left Northern Ireland to begin a new life in the United States. She has filed for a divorce.
Mr Howell (50) who is due back in court in Antrim tomorrow for a remand hearing is to face further questioning by detectives heading up the double-murder investigation which also involves a probe into the death of his father-in-law who died suddenly just 12 days before his daughter Lesley (31) and Constable Buchanan (32) were found dead.
The bodies of the pair were discovered in a car filled with exhaust fumes. At the time it was thought they died in a suicide pact, but detectives launched a murder investigation earlier this year after interviewing the dentist.
He is also charged with drugging and indecently assaulting four women patients on separate dates over a 10-year period.
Mr Howell's former lover, Constable Buchanan's wife Hazel Stewart (45) — she later remarried — is also charged with the double murder. She was granted £15,000 bail after being ordered to surrender her passport and report daily to police.
PA